Eye On The Prize
by The Brod Road
Summary: An old fic of mine I had up on DeviantArt. Matrix suddenly finds himself without a certain important part of him. Where did it go anyway? (Short comedy plot-bunny.)


Alright, followers and ReBoot fans, this is a short little plot-bunny I had a few years ago and had posted on DeviantArt. I just realized that I never thought to upload it here on . Funny, huh? Anyways, this is basically a short, humorous one-shot and I thought I'd correct my oversight while I (slowly) work on my other stories so that I feel like I'm still contributing content. Hope you all enjoy.

Disclaimer: I own nothing, as usual.

ReBoot: Eye On The Prize

Matrix: mercenary, renegade, badass, and Guardian. Ever since he and his lover, AndrAIa, survived their voyage through the Games, he had always relied on the idea of being strong, being able to protect his friends and family and whup the ASCII of any threat that tried to do harm. However, on one particular nano, he couldn't help but feel like something was missing when he awoke. Namely, half of his vision. Instantly upon realizing the problem, he put his hand on his face, a finger feeling for the artificial golden eye that had become second nature to him. Instead, his finger poked into an empty eye socket. His targeting eye was missing! Looking over onto the wall where Gun was usually hung upon a wall-mounted display, he wasn't surprised to see his weapon missing. Gun was programmed to go wherever it's peripheral, the Golden Eye, went. Because of said programming, the firearm had become like an extension of himself whenever fists weren't enough.

If it was one thing that Enzo Matrix hated, it was to be reminded of the painful time he originally lost half his eyesight in the fateful Mortal Kombat game. He never got used to it and the pain never left him alone until he and AndrAIa stumbled upon the system that had the technology to produce a solution, thus the Mercenary Upgrade of the Golden Eye and the Gun. At the time, AndrAIa didn't like the idea of her Enzo using such a dangerous weapon, much less having one as a semi-sentient pet that couldn't leave his presence. But it was either go mercenary or go through more games and gambling on luck to land them on a system with more of a medical program. The rest was ReadMe history.

He couldn't help but mutter as he got dressed. Who the hell steals somebody's artificial eye while the victim's logged off? That made no sense. But whoever did it was certainly going to be beaten down to null food by the time Matrix was through! And so, after adding an eyepatch to his attire, the search began. First stop, Dot's Diner.

Cecil didn't particularly like anybody that gave him scrap and he especially didn't give a spam about Bob. But whenever the renegade Matrix entered, the curt waiter-program didn't hesitate to direct him toward either Dot or AndrAIa, although Matrix couldn't be sure whether that was because Cecil respected his boss's family or if he was just plain scared of him. Today, it was Dot that Matrix wanted to see.

"Hi, Matrix. What's with the eyepatch?" Right to the point, as always. That's Dot for you.

"Someone pirated my eye. Do you have any idea if there was any unauthorized entries into my file domain last night?" As Mainframe's , it was easy for Dot Matrix to review the security logs of any place in the system. All she needed was her trusty datapad, which she immediately grabbed and started typing.

"Who in the net steals someone's false eye? Oh well, let's see… Hmm… There doesn't seem to be anything wrong. Just you and AndrAIa, like usual. Are you ok, brother?" she asked. Big renegade or not, he was still Enzo, even if there was another little Enzo running around.

"Yeah. The pain subsided long ago. It just feels…weird" he muttered, almost secretively. Even to this nano, he still wouldn't tell her how exactly he lost his original eye. It would freak her out and he didn't want to do that. It was enough for her to get used to the idea that, along the journey, it happened. So no, he wouldn't say that having an empty eye socket again felt disturbing. He needed to find that eye.

"I guess that would feel strange. Bob will help. Last I heard, he was at Level 31. Something about hanging with the guys. Sigh… Well, at least this might help see if Al's Wait and Eat is any safer since we defeated Megabyte…" Dot smirked. She always smirked whenever her favorite laid-back Guardian could be conned into doing tasks. Not that he minded…much. Matrix had to smile a little. It was great to see his sister happy again. With a wave, he left the data diner and started zip-boarding his way to Level 31.

Al's was still a dingy little heap. The system restore saw to that. Biker-type music still emanated from the jukeboxes within, shady customers kept to themselves as they waited and ate, and that was the kind of scene that Matrix was expecting as he walked into the recycle bin of a building. In a corner, he noticed a few familiar faces crowded around a pool table. There was AndrAIa, Bob, Hack, Slash, Mouse, Ray the Web Surfer, and even Hexadecimal.

"Hey Bob! Got a nano?" Matrix called. Oddly enough, Bob, Mouse, and AndrAIa seemed to shudder, as if hit by the jaggies.

"Uhh… Hey, Enzo. Sure, just let me come over there." Bob replied awkwardly. Matrix kept walking closer. "Naah, I don't mind coming over, Bob. I'm looking for something anyway."

"Sparky, I don't think it's a good idea to come over here. Umm… We were talking about something private" stammered AndrAIa. Ok, now something really was fishy, and for once, it wasn't his favorite game sprite! What are they hiding?

Even Hex had something to say. "Yes, Mouse, AndrAIa, and Bob were just talking about how they please their lovers. Oh, how I wish Bob would do that stuff with me! But I digress. Anyway, I'm sure you would feel awkward and out of place in the middle of this chat, since you're so pre-programmed and serious…" Everybody's eyes went wide. Leave it to Hexadecimal to go with a chaotic story.

"Alright, what's going on here?!" Matrix demanded as he kept walking. When he finally got around the sudden wall of sprites that, for some reason, wanted to get between him and the pool table, he saw why they were hiding. In amongst the rest of the pool balls, sitting aside the 8-ball, was a familiar shiny, golden orb… a golden orb with two definitive M insignias on it!

"Why is my eye here…?" Matrix growled. He knew what it was being used for, but he wanted to hear it from them.

"Well, we wanted to play some pool, but… the cue ball was lost" Bob admitted. It was kind of awkward for a Guardian to feel scared of a kid, but this kid had an adult body and a short temper! "But Hex said she knew where to get a real good cue ball at. I knew that I should've returned it as soon as Hex brought it, but… well… you probably would have gotten mad anyway."

"Spam right I'm mad! What the hell, Hex?!"

"What?! It's not like you use it while you're logged off, you low-density fool! You eat, you nap, you merge files with AndrAIa, that's been your entire function lately. You don't need the eye right now, so we're playing pool!" squawked the mask-faced virus, lining up her shot as everyone else had that look of dread on their face. Bob and AndrAIa both waved their arms frantically at Hexadecimal, telling her not to do it. Hack and Slash cowered behind Al's counter. Mouse and Ray… just watched, both somewhat intrigued by the drama.

Hex took her shot, hitting the golden eye as hard as she could. The eye hit the 8-ball and both orbs were sent flying off the board. The 8-ball smashed through a window, but the golden mercenary eye hit Hex's intended target: Matrix's empty eye socket. The renegade stumbled back as he yanked the eyepatch out from inside his eyesocket. It would take him a little while to get his eye adjusted the correct way, but that gave Hex enough time to walk around the pool table to stand in front of him.

"But we're done playing now, little Enzo. You really should get out more anyway. Ever since my 'dear' brother was defeated, you don't really do much. But you should build a social network! Because you know what they say: Keep your eye on the ball!" Hex said, cackling loudly at her own pun as she left Al's before Matrix could get his eye straightened right.

 **Author's Note:** I realize that the ending seems a little sudden, but the joke was made, the punchline was delivered, and everything seemed to work itself out. Lol. Look at it this way: Hex just told Matrix to 'Go Facebook yourself', if ya get what I mean.

Perhaps leave a review for this dust-covered one-shot?


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